Electronic Dissertations and Theses - Critical Culture, Gender, and Race Studieshttp://hdl.handle.net/2376/5297
This collection presents theses and dissertations completed by graduate students in the Department of Critical Culture, Gender, and Race Studies at Washington State University

2019-09-15T02:20:09ZInterrogating Moral Mothers, Mama Grizzlies, and Women Warriors: Towards a Queer Transnational Feminist Antimilitarismhttp://hdl.handle.net/2376/4734
Interrogating Moral Mothers, Mama Grizzlies, and Women Warriors: Towards a Queer Transnational Feminist Antimilitarism
This project examines the neoliberal context and public discourses that have surrounded the "War on Terror"--especially the rhetorical hijacking of feminism--and the impact on feminist antimilitarism. The primary research for this project was composed of participant observation, interviews, archival analysis, and testimonies of feminist peace activists in the United States. This project weaves activists' voices with the existing theoretical frameworks of activism and with cultural studies analysis of public discourse. The discourse analysis builds from scholarship that establishes that beyond the model and policy of global economic expansion, neoliberalism also profoundly shapes our ideologies through cultural, social, and political acceptance of consumer choice in place of political engagement and individual autonomy in place of social welfare. Through interviews with feminist antimilitarists, it become clear that neoliberalism acts both with and against the agency and identities of social movements; recognizing the influence of neoliberalism in social movements, I investigate the direct action tactics of current antimilitarist activism within feminist organizations operating in the United States, including Women in Black, Code Pink, and the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom. For instance, in my analysis of social networking technologies used by peace activists and the Occupy Wall Street Movement, I argue that there has been a depoliticization of activism through the fetishization of media technology, which both offers new modes of communication and obscures the labor of organizers. In my analysis of Code Pink's demands for a "peace budget" in place of a militarist budget, which resists the sexist and racist economics of the shrinking welfare state, I examine how it simultaneously confronts and appropriates the model of neoliberal citizenship that equates tax dollars to a vote. Feminist antimilitarist activism and scholarship complicates the essentialist notion that men are innately militarists and women are pacifists; therefore, they offer a space to interrogate the gendered logics and assumptions about the nature and functioning of contemporary politics. This study of feminist antimilitarist activism in relation to neoliberalism offers new and complex ways of examining how culture engenders militarism and activists' ability to dismantle it.
Thesis (Ph.D.), American Studies, Washington State University
2013-01-01T00:00:00ZCampaign For Edutainment: Afrocentric Philosophy and Hip Hop Pedagogy as a Method For True Liberationhttp://hdl.handle.net/2376/4805
Campaign For Edutainment: Afrocentric Philosophy and Hip Hop Pedagogy as a Method For True Liberation
The constructions of Black identity seldom come from self-identification, but are more derived from the depictions created and endorsed by Western definitions of Africa and the Diaspora. These stereotypes depict Blacks as intellectually inferior, prone to sexual deviancy, naturally criminal, and uncivilized. But what is most important is that Blacks buy into these impressions that cause systematic self-destructive tendencies such as criminality, lack of enthusiasm in education, and economic despair. In order for Black communities to be empowered so as to begin to dismantle the economic, social, political, and cultural structures built through the mis-education of Black people and others of color Afrocentric ideas and principles can be analyzed and delivered to Black communities. Afrocentric concepts can work to invigorate Black youth's enthusiasm for education, tailoring individuals and groups to take control of their agency.The implementation of current Afrocentric paradigms limits crossover between the academy and Black communities. One way to reach those who need it most is to apply Afrocentric concepts within Hip Hop culture. Since Hip Hop is the most appealing cultural characteristic of Black youth, it can become an effective medium with which to convey Afrocentric thought to the most vulnerable and important members of Black communities. Utilizing Hip Hop to engage young Blacks to change their worldviews and self-impressions via the concepts of Afrocentric thought can enact possible social change in areas oft ignored by the State.
Thesis (Ph.D.), Washington State University
2013-01-01T00:00:00ZEXPRESSIONS OF RESISTANCE: INTERSECTIONS OF FILIPINO AMERICAN IDENTITY, HIP HOP CULTURE, AND SOCIAL JUSTICEhttp://hdl.handle.net/2376/4106
EXPRESSIONS OF RESISTANCE: INTERSECTIONS OF FILIPINO AMERICAN IDENTITY, HIP HOP CULTURE, AND SOCIAL JUSTICE
The unique relationship to colonization for Filipinos has challenged Filipino Americans in their identity development and understanding of Philippine history. Although American exceptionalism has been heavily indoctrinated into the Filipino diaspora due to the colonial education system in the Philippines, Filipino American youth have been able to still recognize themselves as a marginalized community in the U.S. due to their lower socioeconomic status and interactions with racism. By focusing specifically on Filipino Americans and the ways in which hip hop culture has been a site for expressing resistance through identity, my work will expose why hip hop culture has appealed to many Filipino Americans as a tool to resist and subvert oppression. Studying Filipino Americans and hip hop culture exposes the democratizing ways that hip hop culture enables Filipino American resistance to be successfully expressed and recognized. Through qualitative interviews with Fil Ams with significant ties to hip hop culture and the Fil Am community, this paper examines how these Fil Ams perceive their work by incorporating their connections to Filipino and Filipino American communities. This paper examines the reciprocal impact between Filipino Americans and hip hop culture. It looks at how Filipino American involvement in hip hop culture integrates a culture of resistance in identity development. From these intersections, the idea of
Thesis (Ph.D.), American Studies, Washington State University
2012-01-01T00:00:00ZIS THERE POTENTIAL FOR EDEN ON DIVISION STREET: ANTI-COLONIAL DISCOURSE, MIGRATION AND THE GOD OF NATIONALISMhttp://hdl.handle.net/2376/4115
IS THERE POTENTIAL FOR EDEN ON DIVISION STREET: ANTI-COLONIAL DISCOURSE, MIGRATION AND THE GOD OF NATIONALISM
In the past few decades, Puerto Rican Cultural Studies have explored divergent subject positions regarding cultural performance and Puerto Ricans' political and migratory history. Using correspondence with former FALN member Oscar Lopez Rivera, this dissertation explores the cultural heritage debate that emerges as a result of Puerto Rican scholarship that attempts to defend and critique Puerto Ricans' "national character." In so doing, this dissertation draws attention to the multiple nationalisms at play. According to one of the first letters I received from Oscar Lopez Rivera, the "cultural heritage," debate is not complex because of the myriad forms of access one has to Puerto Rican cultural and political history. That access, as explored by scholars writing on Puerto Rican political organizations of the mid-twentieth century, frames how Puerto Ricans in the United States approach Puerto Rico's colonial question. Divergent subject positions on the status question--whether or not Puerto Rico is a colony of the US and whether or not statehood, or independence would be feasible options--allude to the complexity. The disparities between migrant and island-based Puerto Ricans further said complexity because of the inherent negotiations made as a result of social and political marginalization in contrast to relatively greater socio-economic stability. For both communities, the question of contribution and participation arises, resulting from racialized, gendered, classed, and sexualized marks of exclusions and silence. Using Chela Sandoval's Methodology of the Oppressed and Jose Esteban Munoz's Cruising Utopia, this dissertation argues that the complexities in the cultural and political discourse that addresses said question provide greater avenues of possibility. Exploring the possibilities of reconfiguring the role of discourse in assigning the value of contribution and participation, this dissertation incorporates Division Street, a novella that functions as a social commentary regarding the discursive and ideological parameters set around participation and contribution. Because the primary figures who model participation and contribution are male--both because of the discourse they produce and how others ideologically construct them--the novella's female characters function as antagonists to what leaders like Pedro Albizu Campos, Filiberto Ojeda Rios imagine as necessary to critically contribute to the anti-colonial struggle.
Thesis (Ph.D.), American Studies, Washington State University
2012-01-01T00:00:00Z